Somebody Left the Faucet On...

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.” ~Romans 1:16-17 (ESV)

So in the gospel of Christ, faith is, beginning and end, the only thing that allows for the righteousness of God to dwell in the hearts of believers. This is basically saying that God is our righteousness because 1) we believe He is and 2) it is the only saving truth--the gospel. Another way to translate it is "the one who by faith is righteous shall live." The application is that we can be confident in our salvation as we find ourselves on equal terms with God because of our faith in Him and the grace He has given us.

God is a God of grace. As we saw last week, His grace covers all our sin. His grace is something that we can trust in to never leave; it will always be there when we fail, and it will always be waiting for us to return to Him. It is something we can stand on, something we can take root in, and something we can always drink from. God's righteousness is like a fountain overflowing with water, and as long as the faucet is still running, we can still come and drink from the excess of His perfection. God's grace is such that the faucet never stops flowing, producing in the willing and submissive heart a life of joy lasting for eternity.

~Psalm 87:7~

As they make music they will sing, "All my fountains are in you." (NIV)

Singers and dancers alike will say," My whole source of joy is in you." (HCSB)

Then singers, as they play their instruments, will declare, "All my roots are in you." (ISV)

As for the singers, as well as the pipers--all of them sing within your walls. (NET)

Lastly, when we share the gospel with others, the beginning and ending of our testimony and proclamation of God's salvation should be the faith all must find in Him. When the goal is to glorify God, we can only accomplish it by being perfectly satisfied in Him. When the goal is to be satisfied in Him, we can only accomplish it by realizing His perfect righteousness and accepting it as our own. So when we declare God's truth, we should always come back to the fountain of grace found only in Christ Jesus. When we have faith enough to see God's fountain of life and abounding grace, we have the opportunity to come, confess, and be renewed, ready to worship God with a free and righteous spirit.

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law,
although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it—the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, Whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood,
to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
~Romans 3:21-26 (ESV)